A blog dedicated to documenting my progression as a hobbyist, and my eternal indecision about what to paint next!

Monday 31/10/2011 – On Authors and Elves

Today we have a special weekend issue, following three days of intense hobby gratifcation in several interesting, perhaps obscure ways!

Saturday:

Dan Abnett came to Bluewater! I won’t lie, he is my absolute favourite author of all time. After getting the book signed and the photo taken as demanded by common sense, he and I had a very good chat (maybe chat is too weak a word, rather I monopolised him for two hours!) about anything and everything He even said he recognised me from last time I talked his poor ears off! =P.

I didn’t know he played Guard! I suppose it makes sense doesn’t it?

Our chat covered a variety of subjects, starting off regarding Double Eagle and the planned sequel ‘Interceptor City’ which I’ve been waiting several years for, and will be waiting until the Horus Heresy series is done with until it’s written. Talking about what he had planned for the second Phantine Air Corps book was interesting and informative, in a way that only chatting with Mr Abnett can be. The conversation then, predictably, moved onto writing and I bought up NaNoWriMo, a competition to get a 50,000+ word novella written in a month. While he was not certain the quality of such an amount crammed into such a small space of time would amount to much, he reccommended it as a writing excercise and so I shall be undertaking this challenge once again – hopefully to succeed this year!

Sunday:

Today was a pretty dull day out, and I had some superglue and a silly number of paperclips just BEGGING to be used up. So I built me some Vultures.

The models went together PERFECTLY! No unwarping required, just a quick scrub in some warm soapy water before assembly. Got them both done relatively quickly, as I’ve built these things several times in the past…but sadly before I could finish them fate intervened and turned my superglue into gunge! Oops… Maybe next time I should make sure the release agent is 100% gone…

Monday:

Today was the much anticipated rematch vs the Tomb Kings! We got started nice and early, and this time apparantly he had a “proper” 1500pt list, rather than a 2000pt one he’d just cut bits from…

Game 1: 1500pts Dark Elves vs Tomb Kings

Result: Win

Wow, this game went soooo much better than expected!

There was some pretty poor dice rolling on my opponent’s side, losing deployment AND first turn, before then rolling a total of 3 Power Dice on his first and second turns!

My Assassins redeemed themselves, one killing a Warsphinx and the Casket of Souls and the other killing his Hierophant and several skeletons!

The Lore of Shadow was also redeemed this game. Though Pit of Shades once again did BUGGER ALL, The Penumbral Pendulum and The Withering helped out immensely!

End of turn 6, he was left standing with his General and about 10 Skeletons with Hand Weapons and Shields, whereas he had killed 4 Shades, a Sorceress, 5 Dark Riders and I had managed to kill a further 2 Dark Riders through fluffed Dangerous Terrain rolls (oops!)

Biggest surprises of the game for me were: 1) Warsphinx uses Initiative of the crew, which is 3…so that 2 on his Initiative Check was a pass instead of a fail! It’s madness! (Damn You Cruddace! *shakes fist wildly*) and 2) I won…this is my first win in 8th Edition with this army at this points level – I’m really hoping it wasn’t a fluke!

Overall, a pretty productive weekend!

Tomorrow, I playtest 1500pts of Elysians against either Sisters of Battle or Daemons, each of which will provide its own challenges!